A Study Predicts Record Flooding In The 2030s, And It's Partly Because Of The Moon
Related: Rapid increases and extreme months in projections of United States high-tide flooding (Nature Climate Change)
Also: Moon ‘wobble’ and climate change could mean ‘double whammy’ of flooding in 2030s, NASA warns (Washington Post)
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Source: NPR
A Study Predicts Record Flooding In The 2030s, And It's Partly Because Of The Moon
July 14, 2021 5:12 PM ET
JOSIE FISCHELS
A new study on high tide flooding predicts that the mid-2030s could be catastrophically wet in U.S. coastal regions — and it could stay that way for an entire decade.
Led by members of the NASA Sea Level Change Team from the University of Hawaii, the study says that high tide flooding could happen more frequently on several U.S. coasts. Flooding at high tide, often called nuisance flooding, already occurs with regularity in many coastal communities as water routinely sloshes into streets, yards and businesses.
Two factors could converge to worsen flooding at high tide, the study says: rising sea levels fueled by climate change — and the moon.
The moon is about to "wobble"
The moon's orbit is due for its regular "wobble." That is entirely natural, NASA says, and it has been recorded as far back as 1728. Half of the moon's 18.6-year cycle creates lower high tides and higher low tides; the other creates higher high tides and even lower low tides.
But NASA says global sea level rise will likely push those high tides higher, and one of the study's co-authors, NASA Sea Level Change Team leader Ben Hamlington, said that because waters will be higher, this moon cycle could have a much more dramatic effect.
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Read more: https://www.npr.org/2021/07/14/1015800103/a-study-predicts-record-flooding-in-the-2030s-and-its-partly-because-of-the-moon
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Source: Washington Post
Moon ‘wobble’ and climate change could mean ‘double whammy’ of flooding in 2030s, NASA warns
By María Luisa Paúl
July 14, 2021|Updated today at 7:30 p.m. EDT
In the coming decades, higher tides coupled with sea-level rise will cause U.S. coastlines to experience a “dramatic” uptick in flooding, a new NASA study finds.
By the mid-2030s, scientists project that there could be a “rapid” increase in the frequency of high-tide flooding in several parts of the country, according to the report published last month in the Nature Climate Change journal by the NASA Sea Level Change Team at the University of Hawaii.
“We’re going to have sort of a double-whammy,” William Sweet, an oceanographer at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and author of the study, said Wednesday. “It means that coastal communities — unless they adapt and fortify — are likely to expect even greater flooding than they might otherwise.”
The increase in flooding is caused in part by the moon’s “wobble.” As it orbits Earth, the satellite’s angle relative to the equator changes over time. This phenomenon — spanning an 18.6-year period — influences how tides ebb and flow.
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Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2021/07/14/moon-wobble-climate-change-could-mean-double-whammy-flooding-2030s-nasa-warns/
